Heroin addict: 'I want my life back'

Greg Little told the court on Thursday, February 13: “I used to have a house, a mortgage, a high-level job with BT and a partner who was a chartered accountant - drugs destroyed all that.”
Claire French, prosecuting, said the 34-year-old, of Newtown Road, Newbury, was already subject to a 21 month suspended prison sentence when he stole meat worth £66.39 from the town’s BP Service Station on January 15 this year.
Magistrates’ official guidelines advise they should activate a suspend sentence in such circumstances unless they were convinced it would be unjust to do so.
Mr Little admitted the theft and breaching the suspended sentence.
Mike Davis, defending, said Mr Little stole food because his benefit had not arrived following his latest discharge from prison and he had been “starving.”
He handed magistrates a letter from the drug rehabilitation organisation Turning Point which praised, at some length, Mr Little’s efforts to get ‘clean’ and added: “The prison regime holds no great difficulty for him - what he is doing with his life now is the difficult option.”
He then called his client to give evidence and Mr Little told magistrates: “I’ve been addicted to heroin for 10 years and been to prison on a number of occasions. I would come out and go back on drugs.
“But this time is different - I’m really motivated. I’ve realised that I only have a number of years left to make something of myself and to regain the respect of my family and friends.”
He added: “If you agree not to send me to prison today I will continue working with Turning Point and providing clean specimens when tested. I want to get my problems sorted, once and for all. I want my life back. I don’t want to lose all the gains I’ve made.”
Mr Little said his life was structured around his drug rehabilitation programme and that he had even joined voluntary therapy groups.
He concluded: “Thank you for listening to me. If you give me this chance, I won’t be back.”
After retiring with colleagues to consider sentencing, presiding magistrate Sue Campbell told Mr Little. “We are impressed by the letter from Turning Point and we have been impressed by you and your eloquence. We accept this offence was an act of desperation and was different in that it was not motivated by the need for drugs but by hunger.
“We therefore find that it would be unjust to send you to prison today.”
The bench instead imposed a 12 month conditional discharge to run alongside the continuing suspended prison sentence.
Mr Little was also required to pay a £30 statutory surcharge.